We’re excited to introduce you to the always interesting and insightful Cole Thiele. We hope you’ll enjoy our conversation with Cole below.

Cole, thanks for joining us, excited to have you contributing your stories and insights. Can you talk to us about a project that’s meant a lot to you?

My brothers and I have always encouraged each others’ creative interests and we have each made a number of short films, which if you were to spend the arduous task of reading the credits you might notice that our names have a tendency to find their way into the others’ works. We often discussed the idea of creating our first feature length film together… so we did! We wrote the script of our comedy in 2019 and decided that 2020 was going to be the year to do it. We were able to continue with our goal while implementing the pandemic CDC guidelines during production and fulfill our dream of making a movie. What we thought might take a year or so turned into about four years. With a very small crew consisting of our actors, our sound guy and my brothers (Kyle and Eli) and I, we set about our home city, Dayton, Ohio. There were lots of challenges along the way that none of us could have foreseen or prepared for and I would like to acknowledge everyones’ support, efforts and kindness with my gratitude. While I would like to say that the Thiele Brothers have paved their futures with perfect bricks of movie magic we are still navigating what comes next. We are very excited to have our film, “Sofa, So Good” in multiple festivals and it was wonderful to hear the laughter of friends and family during our cast and crew screening.

Simultaneously, I was attending Columbus College of Art and Design getting my Bachelor of Fine Arts with a focus in 2D animation. I decided to develop a pilot episode, called “CARBOLOAD,” which I started my sophomore year of college. I was able to incorporate varying aspects of the creative process into different classes along the way, which coalesced into my capstone project. By the time I had finished writing, designing, directing, animating, etc. my animation’s run time was five minutes and forty-one seconds. Now that may sound anticlimactic but that’s on average 24 frames per second and drawn by hand. It so happened that I was able to finish “CARBOLOAD” in time to screen as an opener to “Sofa, So Good”‘s cast and crew screening!

Cole, love having you share your insights with us. Before we ask you more questions, maybe you can take a moment to introduce yourself to our readers who might have missed our earlier conversations?

My name is Cole Thiele. Storytelling has always been a passion of mine. When I was about sixteen I decided to make my first live-action short film, “Symbionic.” I was thrilled to hear that it got into the Young Filmmakers Program in the Austin Film Festival’s 25th Anniversary! I felt very encouraged and decided to make another short film, “Mr. Chester,” the year after. I attended Columbus College of Art and Design and learned to animate while I was there. I love spending time with my family, hiking, reading, sculpting, drawing, and snorkeling. After graduating, making a feature film, and an animated pilot episode, I am continuing to work on creative projects.

What do you think is the goal or mission that drives your creative journey?

I feel that my original intentions for creating were very genuine and pure. That I was creating solely out of fun or relaxation. It helped me when I was bored to draw or even make friends. But, as I got older, I felt this unnecessary pressure to feel validated by my work – that it would define me. Cole Thiele the “insert job title here” who works at “insert studio here”. Right now is a very difficult time to get into the animation industry and it is very discouraging receiving those job and internship declines. And doubt about my abilities creep in with every reply….But I realized I am just as much an artist/creator as those I revere. Whether everyone sees my work or not, there is still beauty in that which is unseen. My goal is to return to my pure state of creativity of doing it for myself and sharing with those I wish.

How can we best help foster a strong, supportive environment for artists and creatives?

Don’t use AI, please. It is stealing peoples’ art and writings and regurgitating it. Think of it like this…If you can’t copy and paste other writings for the entirety of your essay for a school assignment then why should a machine be able to do this? And I’ll leave it at that.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://colethieleart.carrd.co/
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/colethieleart/
• Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/cole-walker-thiele-2577b61a2/

Image Credits
Jesse Ly